Every order is original, expert-done, and screened for AI — full report on request.See how it works

Assignment questions
NursingEssayWorkplace violence

Active shooters and nursing bullying paper guide

A 750-1,250-word APA paper in two parts: compare the four assigned active-shooter articles and answer the workplace-preparedness questions, then research bullying in nursing and advise the new nurse being targeted.

Editorial process

Last reviewed · August 12, 2026

01

What is the four-article comparison really testing?

The source requirements are the first grading trap: the paper must contain all four provided articles, plus the textbook, plus one scholarly source of your own choosing — six citations minimum in a paper capped at 1,250 words, which means every source earns a specific job rather than a decorative mention. Part one's comparison task tells you what those jobs are. The four assigned pieces disagree productively: the preparedness guidance assumes hospital shootings can be planned for, while one of the assigned articles argues most hospital shootings are not preventable, and the news account of the Western Psychiatric shooting supplies the concrete event the others theorize about. Write the comparison as similarities, differences, and surprises — the brief's own three words — and let the preventability disagreement be the centerpiece, because noticing that the assigned sources contradict each other is precisely the reading the instructor built the set to reward.

The personal-experience questions shift the register from literature to your own workplace, and they should be answered as an employee describing a real protocol: whether your facility has prepared, what the response protocol actually says, and what preparations exist — drills, alert systems, lockdown procedures. The responsibility question is the clinically distinctive one, because a nurse cannot simply run: the answer has to reason through the tension between generic self-protection guidance and the professional duty owed to patients who cannot evacuate themselves, which in practice means securing the unit, sheltering patients in place, communicating with responders, and following the facility's protocol as written. Answering it honestly, with the tension acknowledged rather than resolved by a slogan, is what separates a thoughtful professional response from a recited training acronym, and graders read that difference immediately.

Part two moves to bullying in the nursing workforce and asks for three things in order: why bullying is a problem in nursing — where the researched answer runs through hierarchy, the normalized eating-our-young culture, its documented effects on retention, errors, and patient safety; practical suggestions for a new nurse being bullied — documentation, direct address where safe, escalation through the chain and policy, and mentorship; and your responsibility as a witness, which the professional literature frames as active upstander duty rather than neutral observation. This is where your chosen scholarly source and the textbook naturally live. Keep the two parts in one coherent paper — workplace violence in two forms, external and internal — and that framing sentence is free thesis material. A cleaning note: the record circulated with an unrelated theory-development assignment appended after part two; it is excluded from the brief above.

Likely learning objectives

Inferred from the brief — check these against your own rubric.

  • 01
    Compare the four assigned articles as similarities, differences, and surprises, centering the preventability disagreement the set plants.
  • 02
    Answer the workplace questions as protocol description: preparation status, response procedure, and facility measures.
  • 03
    Reason through the nurse's duty to non-evacuable patients against self-protection guidance, honestly.
  • 04
    Research and argue why bullying persists in nursing and what it costs in retention and patient safety.
  • 05
    Advise the bullied new nurse and define the witness's upstander responsibility, meeting the six-source requirement.
Assignment instructionsQuoted verbatim

Read the full question

Review every instruction before using the planning guidance that follows.

APA paper. This assignment should be between 750 and 1250 words in length and contain all four scholarly sources provided plus the textbook and one more scholarly source of your choice. Read the following 4 articles: (from the ProQuest Library) Security InfoWatch. (2013). Responding to active shooters in hospitals. SecurityInfoWatch.Com. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1434488744?accountid=34574. Click Here for Article Balingit, M. (2012, March 9). Hospital shootings shock Oakland 2 dead, 7 injured at Western Psych; Police kill gunman in exchange of fire. Pittsburgh Post – Gazette. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/926869011?accountid=34574 Hospital Employee Health. (2013). Most hospital shootings are not preventable. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1282083457?accountid=34574 (from the World wide web) The Joint Commission. (2014, July). Preparing for active shooter situations. Quick Safety. Retrieved fromhttps://www.jointcommission.org/issues/article.aspx?Article=h1wY0qOAjXjKMD9Np15aXCoh6JDFt4iaFxb%2f%2fTKfNWE%3d Part 1: Case Study on Active Shooters First: Compare and discuss the information in the 4 articles above (any similarities, differences, surprises). Next: Answer these questions on your personal experience: Has your workplace prepared for an active shooter? What is the protocol? What preparations has your hospital taken? What is your responsibility as a nurse caring for patients? Part 2. Bullying Bullying in the nursing workforce has become an increasing topic of concern. Research this topic. Describe reasons why bullying is a problem in nursing. Provide suggestions for a new nurse who is being bullied by coworkers. What is your responsibility if you see a fellow nurse being bullied?
02

Turn the brief into deliverables

  1. 01
    A 750-1,250-word APA paper citing all four provided articles, the textbook, and one chosen scholarly source.
  2. 02
    Part 1: the four-article comparison plus the personal-experience and nurse-responsibility answers.
  3. 03
    Part 2: why bullying is a problem in nursing, suggestions for the bullied new nurse, and the witness's responsibility.
03

How should the two parts share one paper?

01

The four articles in conversation

Compare the assigned set — preparedness guidance against the not-preventable argument, with the Western Psychiatric account as the concrete case — organized as similarities, differences, surprises.

02

Your workplace, your duty

Describe the facility's preparation and protocol from experience, then reason the nurse's responsibility to patients who cannot run — securing, sheltering, following protocol.

03

Bullying: the researched problem

Argue why bullying persists in nursing — hierarchy, normalized culture — and what it costs in retention, errors, and safety, on scholarly sources.

04

Advice and upstander duty

Give the new nurse the practical sequence — document, address, escalate, seek mentorship — and define the witness's active responsibility.

04

Where are preparedness and bullying standards documented?

Recommended databases

  • CISA
  • OSHA
  • American Nurses Association

Search sequence

  1. 1.
    Read the active-shooter preparedness guidance for the protocol vocabulary part one's questions expect.
  2. 2.
    Review the workplace-violence overview for the healthcare-sector framing that joins the two parts.
  3. 3.
    Use the professional association's position material for the bullying section's causes and duties.
  4. 4.
    Draft part one around the articles' disagreement, part two around the researched answers, in one paper.
05

Reference shortlist

These are authoritative starting points, not a ready-made bibliography. A qualified reviewer must confirm that each source fits the assignment and supports the claim beside which it is cited.

Nothing here is cleared for citation until you have read it.

  1. 01

    Active Shooter Preparedness

    Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency · 2024

    The current federal preparedness framework — the protocol and preparation vocabulary the workplace questions are answered in.

  2. 02

    Workplace Violence - Overview

    Occupational Safety and Health Administration · 2024

    The regulatory frame that makes both parts one topic — healthcare's elevated workplace-violence risk and the employer's prevention duties.

  3. 03

    Workplace Violence

    American Nurses Association · 2024

    The profession's own position on violence, incivility, and bullying — the source for part two's causes, costs, and the upstander duty.

06

Review before submission

Common mistakes

  • Summarizing the four articles serially instead of comparing them — the disagreement is the point.
  • Missing the source math: four provided articles plus textbook plus one chosen source, all present and cited.
  • Answering the responsibility question with an acronym instead of reasoning through patients who cannot evacuate.
  • Writing part two as opinion when the brief says research the topic.
  • Advising the bullied nurse with platitudes instead of documentation, escalation, and policy steps.
  • Letting the two parts read as two papers stapled together instead of one workplace-violence argument.

Submission checklist

  • All four assigned articles compared: similarities, differences, surprises.
  • Workplace preparedness, protocol, and preparations answered from experience.
  • Nurse-responsibility answer engages the duty-to-patients tension.
  • Bullying section researched: causes, costs, suggestions, witness duty.
  • Six sources cited in APA; 750-1,250 words.

Use this guide to plan and review your own work. Follow your institution's rules and read our academic-integrity policy.

Written by

Aaron Bishop

MA, Education

assignment interpretation and research-methods coaching across disciplines

Aaron leads the EssayCrackers editorial desk. He works on how assignment briefs are read — what a rubric is actually asking for, and where students most often answer a different question than the one set.

Reviewed by

Dr. Nathan Cole

PhD, Rhetoric & Composition

Argumentation and thesis development

Nathan teaches first-year composition and directs a university writing center. He reviews EssayCrackers guides for argumentative soundness and citation accuracy.

Want feedback on your plan before you draft?

Get help interpreting the brief, checking your evidence strategy, and strengthening your outline while keeping the work your own.

Get assignment guidance
Start your order